It appears to me that there are a few peeps that took advantage of buying BTC early, and they appear to have done really well for themselves, even with the 65% drop in BTC price off it's high. I have a feeling that just like the PM run up of 2010/2011, a lot of peeps jumped on the spaceship blasting off, and have now lost their asses! How many times have you read in this forum about the peeps that bought into AG when it was $45/oz? How many commercials on the radio and TV pushed AG and AU IRAs. It appears to me that those same commercials have been edited to replace PMs with BTC. While I'm a very strong personal responsibility advocate, I'm concerned about the impact that is going to be felt from all the lost value that many many people are going through with the precipitous drop in BTC off it's high. Why should I care? It didn't effect me & my family. Right?

To me, the parallels of BTC are striking with the PMs. I just compared the AG price chart from 2003 to 2013, and the BTC price chart for 1/1/17 to present, and the likeness is striking. Eerie actually. If you take away the time frame, they are really really similar. Over the next few weeks/months I wonder if BTC will track similarly to how AG has since 2013?

My opinion is: (At least at this point), BTC is merely digital PM. The fact is it's still measured and traded in currency denominations. Just like PMs. While one can purchase goods a bit more readily with BTC than you can with AG or AU, at the end of the day, BTC, AG, AU, etc. one would still need to convert any of them to the USDs in order for me to make a deposit it into one's checking account, if one resides in the USA. Albeit, the conversion process for BTC involves a whole lot less gas and time. And no matter how popular cryptocurrency becomes, I don't see that fact ever changing.

I think BTC would need to keep falling, and pretty rapidly, to track with the PM charts, since the BTC chart is so condensed in time compared to the PM chart. It seems that they might track through Feb or whenever BTC neared 6k, but in the months since, not so much.

It appears to me that there are a few peeps that took advantage of buying BTC early, and they appear to have done really well for themselves, even with the 65% drop in BTC price off it's high. I have a feeling that just like the PM run up of 2010/2011, a lot of peeps jumped on the spaceship blasting off, and have now lost their asses! How many times have you read in this forum about the peeps that bought into AG when it was $45/oz? How many commercials on the radio and TV pushed AG and AU IRAs. It appears to me that those same commercials have been edited to replace PMs with BTC. While I'm a very strong personal responsibility advocate, I'm concerned about the impact that is going to be felt from all the lost value that many many people are going through with the precipitous drop in BTC off it's high. Why should I care? It didn't effect me & my family. Right?

To me, the parallels of BTC are striking with the PMs. I just compared the AG price chart from 2003 to 2013, and the BTC price chart for 1/1/17 to present, and the likeness is striking. Eerie actually. If you take away the time frame, they are really really similar. Over the next few weeks/months I wonder if BTC will track similarly to how AG has since 2013?

My opinion is: (At least at this point), BTC is merely digital PM. The fact is it's still measured and traded in currency denominations. Just like PMs. While one can purchase goods a bit more readily with BTC than you can with AG or AU, at the end of the day, BTC, AG, AU, etc. one would still need to convert any of them to the USDs in order for me to make a deposit it into one's checking account, if one resides in the USA. Albeit, the conversion process for BTC involves a whole lot less gas and time. And no matter how popular cryptocurrency becomes, I don't see that fact ever changing.

Cheers!

It totally mimics PM's. When I noticed this i sold off on the second runup. The difference is that I don't think its entirely like PM's, unless you're talking specifically about BTC as digital gold. At the same time, businesses are being built bringing this tech into mainstream. This also mimics the 2000 dot com era. Between the two, PM's and dot com grew at different rates/multipliers. ETH introduced the possibility of a market platform for utilities like stock markets that are more living. The whole second layer application ecosystem will continue to grow. If its like the stock market, then there's room to grow. When you factor in that this is a global playground, the multipliers are more than even US markets. The volatility will stay until the dust settles. When it does you can get it then. Either way, the technology is driven by what's happening now. There's a modernization that's happening that's beyond traditional business. Traditional business isn't even able to do it right yet, so there's lots of opportunities. The difference is now you can go direct to your bank. Think of it as there's a possibility for a digital currency that rides the internet that is available in every local currency. That's a pretty powerful tool that can be automated with other systems like logistics, supply chain once everything settles down and infrastructure is built and secured. There are many more possibilities now for fair collaboration. Everyone knows the dollar is stumbling, what's the other option? It might not be BTC, but who knows. There's definitely risk but that's the price paid for pioneering. If you think about it, we're transitioning..

AI, Machine Learning, digital based money, driverless cars/bikes/subs/planes/boats, personal drones, vr, information at your fingertips. The technology now is very advanced and kids are growing in this. Drones to kids these days are like our walkmans. Everything on a global scale. So Big change coming, yuuge.. Some people i talk to are noticing it too.

My main gripe with crypto is that its just to frigging complicated and so easy to screw yourself. It's still got a long way to go but that means theres a future.

silverpv wrote:AI, Machine Learning, digital based money, driverless cars/bikes/subs/planes/boats, personal drones, vr, information at your fingertips. The technology now is very advanced and kids are growing in this.

Bucketeer wrote:It is looking to me that Bitcoin is going to make another run-up in the next 4-6 weeks. Strap-in and keep your powder dry. Be a HODLER, enjoy your investment, and don't worry about the price.

You seem to be recommending three very different things with this statement:

1) hold

2) if it's going to run up, then one should buy now

3) keep your powder dry - that would enable one to be able to buy later (after the run-up?).

2) Perhaps - that is for the newbs that bought at 14K and sold at 9K. Now they understand the "volatility" that exists with BTC. Hopefully they will become hodlers and forget about the price, instead of thumbing their phone every 15 minutes.

The greatest wisdom I learned from BS is not to worry about the price of silver, and instead think about the size of your stack. Same goes for BTC.

3) That's for those who have established positions. We don't really need anymore. Hard to explain this one.You can't trade physical BTC in a fast market - the exchanges can't handle the volume. Use the futures market if you want to trade. The contract size is 5 BTC, margin is 48% (last I checked).

The only thing I said is that I think that BTC is setting up for another run in the next month or two. It is basing very nicely in the mid-7's. Sorry for the confusion, must have been the Irish coffee this morning.

Yup, hardly any power at all being completely wasted just so people can buy stuff at a minuscule number of places.

How much power is "wasted" every night by people watching TV? At the end of a netflix binge session, you have nothing to show for it but memories. What can you buy with it? Across America, how many gigawatts of power is consumed every evening by televisions? At least after the power to mine bitcoin is consumed, the bitcoin remains. Forever.

jcz1 wrote:Yup, hardly any power at all being completely wasted just so people can buy stuff at a minuscule number of places.

That darn free market, and people voluntarily using it - not by government decree or force, but pure free choice. We should surely ban something you don't like because.... power consumption? You hold no crypto, you will never buy crypto. Why do you continue to post in this thread?

I can't buy anything directly with my silver and gold, I have to sell them for cash first. And what's with all the energy and labor required to get precious metals out of the ground in the first place? We really should go back to using bones and shells for currency.

Long John wrote:I can't buy anything directly with my silver and gold, I have to sell them for cash first. And what's with all the energy and labor required to get precious metals out of the ground in the first place? We really should go back to using bones and shells for currency.

Yup, hardly any power at all being completely wasted just so people can buy stuff at a minuscule number of places.

How much power is "wasted" every night by people watching TV? At the end of a netflix binge session, you have nothing to show for it but memories. What can you buy with it? Across America, how many gigawatts of power is consumed every evening by televisions? At least after the power to mine bitcoin is consumed, the bitcoin remains. Forever.

Yup, hardly any power at all being completely wasted just so people can buy stuff at a minuscule number of places.

How much power is "wasted" every night by people watching TV? At the end of a netflix binge session, you have nothing to show for it but memories. What can you buy with it? Across America, how many gigawatts of power is consumed every evening by televisions? At least after the power to mine bitcoin is consumed, the bitcoin remains. Forever.

Wanna guess how many people are employed because of TV and Netflix?

How many people are employed to produce goods that can be purchased with bitcoin? That number is much higher. If you mine a bitcoin, you can purchase anything you want with it. Food, a house, a car, a TV, a cable package, dinner at Applebees, new shoes from the mall, gold, silver, etc. You may have to convert it to fiat, but mining bitcoin created value from "wasted power" nonetheless. If mining bitcoin is "wasted power", all energy consumption is wasted power, isn't it?

God gave us the energy to be consumed-- albeit, wisely. But consumed nevertheless.

Gen. 1:27-28 27 God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. 28 God blessed them; and God said to them, "Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it; and rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over every living thing that moves on the earth."

Yup, hardly any power at all being completely wasted just so people can buy stuff at a minuscule number of places.

How much power is "wasted" every night by people watching TV? At the end of a netflix binge session, you have nothing to show for it but memories. What can you buy with it? Across America, how many gigawatts of power is consumed every evening by televisions? At least after the power to mine bitcoin is consumed, the bitcoin remains. Forever.

Wanna guess how many people are employed because of TV and Netflix?

How many people are employed to produce goods that can be purchased with bitcoin? That number is much higher. If you mine a bitcoin, you can purchase anything you want with it. Food, a house, a car, a TV, a cable package, dinner at Applebees, new shoes from the mall, gold, silver, etc. You may have to convert it to fiat, but mining bitcoin created value from "wasted power" nonetheless. If mining bitcoin is "wasted power", all energy consumption is wasted power, isn't it?

Seriously? You wanna compare the INCREASE in employment numbers directly attributable to the spending of mined bitcoins vs the total number employed by TV and Netflix? Sure, go ahead and provide that number.

Yup, hardly any power at all being completely wasted just so people can buy stuff at a minuscule number of places.

How much power is "wasted" every night by people watching TV? At the end of a netflix binge session, you have nothing to show for it but memories. What can you buy with it? Across America, how many gigawatts of power is consumed every evening by televisions? At least after the power to mine bitcoin is consumed, the bitcoin remains. Forever.

Wanna guess how many people are employed because of TV and Netflix?

How many people are employed to produce goods that can be purchased with bitcoin? That number is much higher. If you mine a bitcoin, you can purchase anything you want with it. Food, a house, a car, a TV, a cable package, dinner at Applebees, new shoes from the mall, gold, silver, etc. You may have to convert it to fiat, but mining bitcoin created value from "wasted power" nonetheless. If mining bitcoin is "wasted power", all energy consumption is wasted power, isn't it?

Seriously? You wanna compare the INCREASE in employment numbers directly attributable to the spending of mined bitcoins vs the total number employed by TV and Netflix? Sure, go ahead and provide that number.

Sigh. Thats not what I said. It was intended to be rhetorical considering I was referencing the entire goods and services economy, not the increase in it from bitcoin. You think mining bitcoin is a waste of power. I'm asking how you can think that when you can purchase anything you want with it. So, semantics aside, how can you say that bitcoin mining is a waste of power if the result is the wealth to purchase any good or service you desire? Btw, you still haven't answered my above question (and I doubt you will) which ties into the question I just asked: "If mining bitcoin is 'wasted power', all energy consumption is wasted power, isn't it?"